Nickel-cadmium batteries provide backup in Qatar

A Saft Industrial Batteries product story
Edited by the Engineeringtalk editorial team Nov 6, 2002

Saft rechargeable nickel-cadmium batteries will provide 8h of autonomous backup power for critical control and protection systems at a new electricity and desalination plant in Qatar.

Saft rechargeable nickel-cadmium batteries will provide 8h of autonomous backup power for critical control and protection systems at the new electricity and desalination plant currently under construction near the city of Ras Laffan in Qatar.

The nickel-cadmium batteries, which will comprise a total of 196 Saft SBL cells, have been selected in preference to lead-acid Plante batteries in order to ensure a longer service life, greater reliability and reduced maintenance requirements in this demanding application where temperatures can range between -10 and +50C.

The Rass Laffan plant is located on the Persian Gulf coast, 100km from Doha, the capital of Qatar.

Two Italian companies are jointly responsible for the development, with Enelpower constructing a 750MW power plant which will provide electricity to Fisia Italimpianti's desalination plant, capable of producing 40 million gallons of water a day, equal to the daily water consumption of a city with a population of 600,000.

CEG Elettronica Industriale - Bibbiena Arezzo, the contractor responsible for the electrical standby systems for Ras Laffan, required eight batteries to back-up an entire 110V system for up to 8h to support the critical DC and AC systems, including motors and emergency lights.

Initially, lead-acid Plante batteries were specified.

However, Fisia Italimpianti, which has substantial experience of rechargeable battery systems in Middle East desalination plants, persuaded CEG to switch to nickel-cadmium batteries.

Valerio Telo of Saft Italy, which is supplying the batteries to CEG, explains that the main advantage of nickel-cadmium batteries in this application is their predictable lifetime, without the risk of sudden death failure: "One of the main problems with lead-acid Plante cells is that their ageing is not linear, which makes it difficult to predict when they will need replacing.

And there is always a possibility of 'sudden death' failure.

In contrast, although their initial purchase cost is higher, nickel-cadmium cells are usually considered a more reliable choice for critical system applications, especially as they are more tolerant of the extreme environmental conditions found in the Middle East.

They also have much longer service life, typically three times as long, and their ageing is linear and easily predictable".

"Another key advantage is that the SBL pocket plate black batteries we are supplying to Ras Laffan require very infrequent maintenance, with electrolyte top-up intervals of 18 months".

For the desalination plant Saft is supplying a total of 92 SBL cells configured as four-off 2560Ah batteries - comprising two parallel strings of 1280Ah, together with two-off 1720Ah batteries - comprising two parallel strings of 860Ah.

For the power plant Saft is supplying 104 SBL cells configured as two 4350Ah batteries - each comprising three parallel strings of 1450Ah.

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